Gender, Rights, & Leadership in History (HIST10017)
Undergraduate level 1Points: 12.5Dual-Delivery (Parkville)
Please refer to the return to campus page for more information on these delivery modes and students who can enrol in each mode based on their location.
Overview
Availability | Semester 2 - Dual-Delivery |
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Fees | Look up fees |
This subject introduces key issues in the history of sex, gender, power and identity. Students will be encouraged to think critically about ideas about gender across diverse places and times and how they have constrained or enabled change. We will examine the challenges faced by women (and people of other minoritized genders and sexualities) in gaining legal and political recognition. Attention will be given both to structural inequalities and changing assumptions about masculinity and femininity, gender relations, sex roles and sexual practices.
The subject focuses first on women’s struggles for rights – to education, the vote, work, citizenship, rights within marriage, reproductive rights – as well as campaigns for recognition of diverse sexualities and of gendered violence. We will analyse these historical contests about gender, within and across lines of race, class and sexuality, reflecting also on how imperialism, colonialism, capitalism and socialism shaped such contests and how people tackled multiple bases of oppression. We will examine struggles to achieve equal rights, so often a goal of the modern state, but also strategies to uphold them across diverse social and political contexts. We ask however what would constitute progress in these areas, to what extent it has been achieved, and why progress is also sometimes reversed.
Secondly the subject focuses on the challenges that women have faced historically in exercising leadership and political power. We critically analyse the experiences of some of the most iconic and mythologised women leaders, as well as a selection of significant women who inherited or were appointed or elected to national leadership. Most of the world’s nations have never had a woman leader. Does history help us understand why this is so? And what does this mean for how women are considered as leaders and for the history of women and power? We also examine the experiences of women and people of other minoritized genders and sexualities who led campaigns for social, political and economic reform.
Students will read a range of primary sources and learn continually to reflect on the gendered nature of history. The subject will include case studies from Australia, Europe, Asia and the Americas.
Classes will be two one-hour lectures with a 1-hour tutorial a week.
Intended learning outcomes
On completion of this subject, students should be able to:
- describe the different ways women have been involved in shaping major world events;
- be open to new ideas and possibilities and expressing responses to them through constructing an intellectual argument, and demonstrate research skills through competent use of primary materials which are textual and visual alongside scholarly literature and other sources of information;
- reflect critically on various interpretations of leadership and gender in different times and places;
- be able to communicate knowledge intelligibly and economically through written work and class discussions;
- identify how gender and power have been culturally and socially constructed in history and the present;
- analyse the intersection of gender, class, race and ethnicity in power structures, and recognise how these are shaped over time.
Generic skills
Student who successfully complete this subject should be able to:
- apply knowledge gained alongside critical thinking skills to solve problems in contexts such as workplaces and communities;
- be open to new ideas and perspectives;
- take challenges in their thinking, considering multiple possibilities and viewpoints, while always responding in an ethical and responsible manner, and
- develop time management and planning skills.
Last updated: 14 March 2025
Eligibility and requirements
Prerequisites
None
Corequisites
None
Non-allowed subjects
None
Inherent requirements (core participation requirements)
The University of Melbourne is committed to providing students with reasonable adjustments to assessment and participation under the Disability Standards for Education (2005), and the Assessment and Results Policy (MPF1326). Students are expected to meet the core participation requirements for their course. These can be viewed under Entry and Participation Requirements for the course outlines in the Handbook.
Further details on how to seek academic adjustments can be found on the Student Equity and Disability Support website: http://services.unimelb.edu.au/student-equity/home
Last updated: 14 March 2025
Assessment
Description | Timing | Percentage |
---|---|---|
Document analysis
| Week 4 | 15% |
Essay plan
| Mid semester | 20% |
Research essay
| Week 11 | 35% |
Reflective task
| During the examination period | 30% |
Hurdle requirement: 75% of tutorials need to be attended. In-class tasks missed without approval will not be marked. All pieces of assessments must be submitted to pass this subject. | Throughout the semester | N/A |
Last updated: 14 March 2025
Dates & times
- Semester 2
Principal coordinator Annabelle Baldwin Mode of delivery Dual-Delivery (Parkville) Contact hours 24 x 1 hour lectures and 11 x 1 hour tutorials Total time commitment 170 hours Teaching period 26 July 2021 to 24 October 2021 Last self-enrol date 6 August 2021 Census date 31 August 2021 Last date to withdraw without fail 24 September 2021 Assessment period ends 19 November 2021 Semester 2 contact information
Last updated: 14 March 2025
Further information
- Texts
- Breadth options
This subject is available as breadth in the following courses:
- Bachelor of Biomedicine
- Bachelor of Commerce
- Bachelor of Design
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Animation)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Dance)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Film and Television)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Music Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Production)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Screenwriting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Visual Art)
- Bachelor of Music
- Bachelor of Science
- Available through the Community Access Program
About the Community Access Program (CAP)
This subject is available through the Community Access Program (also called Single Subject Studies) which allows you to enrol in single subjects offered by the University of Melbourne, without the commitment required to complete a whole degree.
Please note Single Subject Studies via Community Access Program is not available to student visa holders or applicants
Entry requirements including prerequisites may apply. Please refer to the CAP applications page for further information.
- Available to Study Abroad and/or Study Exchange Students
Last updated: 14 March 2025